Carrefour Brazil, a significant player in the retail industry across Latin America, manages over 1,000 locations, serving vast numbers of customers daily.
At the Pamplona store in São Paulo, one of the city's busiest locales, the company encounters modern retail challenges such as ensuring safety, minimising losses, boosting efficiency, and enhancing the shopping experience on a large scale.
Addressing real-time visibility constraints
Carrefour faced challenges stemming from manual processes and fragmented systems, resulting in inaccurate alarms and inconsistent services. High volumes of customer traffic increased vulnerability to theft and fraud, while traditional investigation methods hindered swift incident resolutions.
A lack of real-time visibility on customer flow, queues, inventory, and in-store behaviour further complicated the optimisation of staffing, replenishment, and checkout processes.
Building a unified retail ecosystem
Dahua introduced an integrated smart retail solution centred around video surveillance
To tackle these issues, Dahua introduced an integrated smart retail solution centred around video surveillance, AI analytics, alarm linkage, customer flow analysis, and digital in-store technologies.
This solution, including components such as the DSS PRO platform, Retail Loss Prevention IVD/IVSS, Retail NVR, AcuPick intelligent search, people-counting cameras, Electronic Article Surveillance (EAS) integration, and more, synergises security, operations, and customer engagement into a cohesive retail ecosystem.
Optimising loss prevention through surveillance
Dahua's video analytics allow for the detection of suspicious activities like item concealment and can send real-time alerts to security personnel. Integration with EAS and intrusion alarms offers immediate contextual information, facilitating faster and more accurate responses.
High-value items are safeguarded with anti-theft tags, while restricted areas employ access controls. If incidents occur, AcuPick and intelligent video analysis trace customer or employee movements, significantly reducing investigation time. Additionally, systems are projected to enhance checkout security, with cart analysis identifying unscanned items and intelligent barriers at self-checkout stations preventing premature exits.
Enhancing store operations with data-driven insights
Dahua's technologies support data-driven store operations through people-counting cameras
Beyond security measures, Dahua's technologies support data-driven store operations through people-counting cameras and customer flow analysis. These tools provide insights into store occupancy, peak hours, movement patterns, and high-traffic zones, aiding in better staffing, product placement, promotional planning, and checkout lane management.
Shelf replenishment monitoring alerts to low stock or unusual product removal, promoting timely restocking and improving product availability. Moreover, by integrating electronic shelf labels and digital signage, Carrefour enhances its in-store experience, enabling automatic price updates and an interactive shopping environment through point-of-sale displays.
Transforming retail management
This collaboration with Dahua enables Carrefour Brazil to operate within a safer and more efficient retail environment.
Enhanced operational visibility, improved loss prevention, accelerated incident analysis, and informed staffing and merchandising choices bolster the customer experience from entry to checkout. The project marks Carrefour's shift from traditional store management to a smart retail model powered by integrated security, analytics, and enhanced customer engagement.
Carrefour Brazil is one of the largest retail groups in Brazil and Latin America, operating more than 1,000 stores and serving a high volume of customers every day.
Its Pamplona store in São Paulo, for example, located in one of the city’s busiest areas, greatly reflects the operational complexity faced by modern retailers: maintaining safety, reducing losses, improving efficiency, and delivering a better shopping experience at scale.
Limited real-time visibility
Challenges - Carrefour needed to address several key pain points. Manual processes and disconnected systems created risks of inaccurate alarms and inconsistent service.
High customer traffic increased exposure to theft, fraud, and checkout losses, while traditional investigation methods made incident tracing slow and inefficient. At the same time, limited real-time visibility into customer flow, queues, inventory, and in-store behaviour made it difficult to optimize staffing, replenishment, store layout, and checkout efficiency.
Unified retail ecosystem
Solutions - To meet these needs, Dahua provided an integrated smart retail solution combining video surveillance, AI analytics, alarm linkage, customer flow analysis, and digital in-store technologies.
The solution was built around Dahua’s DSS PRO platform, Retail Loss Prevention IVD/IVSS, Retail NVR, AcuPick intelligent search, people-counting cameras, Electronic Article Surveillance (EAS) integration, alarm host, access control, electronic shelf labels, and digital signage. These systems work together to connect security, operations, and customer engagement within a unified retail ecosystem.
Integration of video surveillance
For loss prevention, Dahua’s video analytics can detect suspicious behaviors such as item concealment and issue real-time alerts to security staff. Integration with EAS and intrusion alarms provides immediate contextual information for each alarm, helping teams respond faster and more accurately. High-value merchandise is further protected with anti-theft tags, while restricted storage areas are secured through access control. In the event of an incident, AcuPick and intelligent video analysis can be used to track the movement paths of customers or employees, significantly reducing investigation time.
The solution is also projected to checkout and self-checkout security. Cart analysis can help to identify unscanned items, while intelligent barriers at self-checkout stations prevent customers from exiting before completing payment. Looking ahead, the integration of video surveillance with transaction data can further support automated sales auditing, discrepancy detection, and faster resolution of operational variances.
Data-driven store operations
Beyond security, Dahua’s smart retail technologies support data-driven store operations. People-counting cameras, customer flow analysis, queue monitoring, and heatmap analysis provide Carrefour with insights into occupancy, peak hours, movement patterns, high-traffic areas, and dwell time. This can help to optimize staff scheduling, product placement, promotional planning, and checkout lane management. Shelf replenishment monitoring enable detection of low stock or abnormal product removal and triggers real-time alerts, helping prevent lost sales and improving product availability.
Dahua also enhanced the in-store customer experience through electronic shelf labels and digital signage. Electronic shelf labels enable automatic price updates, reduce manual errors, and support promotional communication. Digital signage and point-of-sale displays provide product information, strengthen brand presence, and create a more interactive shopping environment.
Interactive shopping environment
Results - As a result, Carrefour Brazil now operates in a safer, more efficient, and more connected retail environment. The project improves operational visibility, strengthens loss prevention, accelerates incident analysis, supports better staffing and merchandising decisions, and enhances the customer journey from entrance to checkout.
Through this collaboration, Dahua helped Carrefour transform traditional store management into an intelligent retail model powered by integrated security, analytics, and digital engagement.